


frosted stones

by serendipitousDescent



Series: Drabble Challenge [4]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-15
Updated: 2019-01-15
Packaged: 2019-10-10 22:04:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17434334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serendipitousDescent/pseuds/serendipitousDescent
Summary: This ocean is a treacherous thing, unfriendly to even the most well-intentioned. Death is the territory it claims, and recent days have only made that more obvious than it had been before. Anything meant to heal, whether imbued with magic or made by hand, becomes useless the moment it touches the water.That is the curse their land carries.Or one of them, at least.





	frosted stones

Water drips down the back of her neck as Hitoka pulls herself to shore. A chill settles in her bones, nearly sapping her entirely of her strength. Nearly pulling her back into the ocean, rather than allowing her to collapse on the rough stone beneath her.

Her fingertips are bloody. Hitoka can’t see the wounds, but the salt water irritates the cuts, a constant reminder that her plunge downwards was not as uneventful as she’d hoped it would be. Still, there is little point in examining them now. Light does not reach this part of the world. And even if she tried to treat them in the dark, there had been no point in bringing bandages and ointments with her in the first place.

This ocean is a treacherous thing, unfriendly to even the most well-intentioned. Death is the territory it claims, and recent days have only made that more obvious than it had been before. Anything meant to heal, whether imbued with magic or made by hand, becomes useless the moment it touches the water. 

That is the curse their land carries. 

Or one of them, at least. 

Hitoka may have already been turned useless alongside everything else. That was never outside the realm of possibilities, but there’s no way to know for certain, not until she’s reached her destination. 

“I hope you’re sure about this, Shouyou,” she murmurs into the darkness. 

Silence answers her, unyielding in its presence.

Hope is fickle. She should have it in spades, because hope is the only thing that can save them now, but Hitoka is not Shouyou. She is only Hitoka, so she squeezes her eyes shut and pretends that his hope - his faith in her, more accurately, will allow her to succeed. 

Then she inches forward until she can no longer feel the salt water at her feet. The rocks grow rougher as she does, their edges sharper than she was prepared for. They dig into the soft flesh of her palms, promising to leave scars for years to come, and the thick soles of her boots are the only things stopping her feet from looking the same.

Her arms start to burn sooner rather than later. The tunnel remains level for only a few feet, before inclining upwards in a dangerous caricature of rock climbing. One where the slightest misstep could end with her falling onto the sharp rocks at the bottom.

Kageyama dared Shouyou to scale the palace walls blindfolded once. Hitoka had giggled and watched from the sidelines right up until Shouyou nearly slipped. Then she’d ran for the barracks, her fear having gotten the worst of her, and got Daichi to convince him to come down.

Shouyou lost the bet, but came out unharmed.

Hitoka can barely imagine a reality where she survives this unharmed. And the chances of her being successful are even slimmer, as likely as Kageyama wearing Seijou’s banner. 

Only once her arms start wavering before reaching for the next hold, once her legs threaten to give out entirely, does the incline level off. There is no ledge to pull herself over. No final push to make everything worth it. That would make this a challenge, rather than a prison.

She still lies there for longer than she should, rolling onto her back in a desperate attempt to catch her breath once she no longer has to hold herself up. She reaches out, touches the low ceiling, and calls the power etched into her arms. Nothing happens, not even the slightest breeze, because the wind cannot reach this place, no matter how hard she wills it to.

Her breath comes out as a broken sob, catching her by surprise. Everything hurts, from the cold, damp hair freezing at the back of her neck to the deep cuts in her hands. From the burning muscles in her limbs to shallow slice along her hip. From her wounded pride to the knowledge that the one thing that promised to be there whenever she needed it has abandoned her.

Lying here forever to wither away until there is nothing left of her becomes more tempting by the second.

Becomes an inevitability.

Becomes the one thing she wants above all else.

Except there are still people depending on her, no matter how much Hitoka wants to stay here, broken and hurting. 

For the first time in months, danger isn’t nipping at her heels, isn’t demanding that she get up and run and run and run until there is nothing left to run from. And perhaps that is a better reason not to stay here than all the people waiting for her on shore. Hitoka wants more than to be safe again. She wants - no, she needs to make sure everyone else is safe as well, safe and happy and  _ together _ . 

Hitoka breathes in, ignoring the growing ache in her ribs, but that hardly deters her as she rolls back over and continues inching forward. She might not believe that this will work. She might be running on fumes. And even if the stories are true, the details could have been wrong. After all, the text they stumbled upon was in the dusty library of an abandoned fortress, its descriptions whimsical and full of metaphors even after taking into account that it was three centuries old. 

All of those things could be true, and most almost certainly are. But Hitoka never would have made it this far if she’d had another option, if she could think of one other thing that could save them.

But if it does turn out to be true, then a few scars will be worth it. 

Keeping her friends and family safe is worth the world. 

The air grows frigid around her, and Hitoka desperately reaches ahead. Her heart skips a beat as her fingers brush against cool stone, the tunnel having come to an abrupt end. It already feels different from everything else in this dark pit, smooth where everything has been rough and jagged, continuous from floor to ceiling rather than broken. She must be close. And even if everything Shouyou gathered is wrong, this is the end. 

These last few inches are easier than the rest of her journey combined. The tunnel is too narrow for her to sit up, but she curls up against the smooth stone as much as possible, her hips turned awkwardly. Her forehead drops against the cold stone, its relief not merely physical. 

“Please,” Hitoka whispers into this otherwise silent place, a hope and a prayer all wrapped up in one.

Then she touches her collarbone, once untouched by magic.

Light is not necessary for her to recall the curving runes she carved into herself. They are both lock and key, both a prison and freedom, and more complexities have been built into this magic than she understands herself. She traces the strong circling design, all the symbols that come together with no end or beginning, and follows it to the knot at the base of her throat. 

Words come to her as soon as she reaches the knot, and she speaks them, murmured into the silence with no response. These words no longer have a meaning attached to them, but that does not diminish their power, does not change their intention.

The earth rumbles around her, urging her to falter. Had Hitoka not repeated this sequence of syllables countless times over these last six months, memorizing them in each spare moment until they appeared in her dreams, she would have. 

Her six months of devotion is rewarded now by smooth stone slipping down into the earth.

Light slips through the crack slowly at first, before shining down upon all at once. Hitoka squeezes her eyes shut as it does, the change too much for her sight to handle. Spots appear on the insides of her eyelids, and she swims through the odd feeling of her perception readjusting, before slowly exhaling. 

Beautiful, is the first thing that enters her mind as she opens her eyes, still squinting against the light. And beautiful is the only word for it, jarring with how different it is from everything else in her life recently. 

Beautiful is the frost covering each smooth stone, clear swirling patterns having formed in the absence of disruption. Beautiful is the mage stone embedded in the cavern’s ceiling, still shining so brightly after who knows how many years. It is the rich fabrics and golden jewelry that have been gathered in the corners, the almost soft curve of ice in the centre of the room. Someone must have carved those familiar sigils into the throne, must have added each imprint of snowflake, even though Hitoka doesn’t know who.

Beautiful is the woman sitting upon that throne, the royal jewel of this cavern deep in a dead sea. She must be Kiyoko Shimizu, her name only barely remembered by the passage of time. 

Neither the paintings nor the statues do her justice.

Her skin, clear and pale, is covered with frost, the delicate patterns of ice clear on her cheeks. Her eyes are closed, and there is not so much as a flutter of her long eyelashes to signify life. If only it were that easy. It already seems too easy for her to be sitting upon that throne, regality radiating off of her down to the way her fingers rest on the arms of her throne.

Hitoka’s gaze drifts down to Shimizu’s parted lips, as still as can be. She shouldn’t be wondering what it would be like to kiss her, except-

Except that her chest rises and falls, like any other person’s. And it happens again, a hysterical laugh bursting from Hitoka as she pulls herself the rest of the way through the hole in the stone. Her legs tremble beneath her weight as she stands, and blood drips down her thigh as she steps forward.

“Shimizu,” she calls into the cavern.

She is so close to being answered. 

“Shimizu,” she repeats, a desperate prayer. 

Only the shredded remains of her shoes prevent her from slipping with her next few steps.

These scraps of good fortune are the only reason she’s made it this far, and Hitoka can only trust in that now. She lets hope fill her as she walks forward, the distance between between her and Shimizu disappearing with each moment. 

The distance between her and Shimizu.

Between her loved ones and safety.

Between despair and hope.

Hitoka can never forget any of that, not even when a gasp rips itself from her throat as her legs give out from underneath her. But the barest hints of good fortune are still with her as she stumbles forward, her gut colliding with something too solid and too soon to be the ground.

She looks upwards, blinking through frustrated tears, then the fight leaves her bones. She allows herself to drop those last few inches, her arms resting on Shimizu’s lap as her cheek presses against a frozen knee. 

She made it.

“Kiyoko,” Hitoka says into the frozen room, despite herself. 

There is no response, nothing to show that Kiyoko will wake from her frozen slumber. Hitoka should recite the second half of the passage now, even if it will mark her mission here as a failure. Better to have this moment for the rest of her life than to allow someone else to swim through an ocean of dead souls, to crawl up a dark tunnel, and then use their frozen queen against them. 

But after everything these long months have brought, Hitoka deserves a few minutes to catch her breath. To bask in the presence of the most beautiful woman she’s ever seen, even if that woman is stuck in some reality that the centuries have long since passed. 

Something brushes against the back of her head, and Hitoka sighs, leaning into the touch before freezing. Cold, but animate. Like fingers running through her hair.

“You came for me,” comes a voice, softer than befitting the frozen queen. 

Hitoka looks up, and just the barest hint of a smile greets her. Yet, that slight upturn of Shimizu’s lips takes her breath away, reminds her of a million moments, left forgotten until now. Almost as if someone tucked them into the furthest corner of her mind and covered them up. A million moments of being at Shimizu’s side, of being anything and everything Shimizu would allow of her.

This might be more of a victory than Hitoka ever could have imagined. 

“Shimizu,” she whispers.

Shimizu’s smile grows until it brightens her entire face. “How many times have I asked you to call me Kiyoko?” 

That smile has only ever been meant for Hitoka.

Then Shimizu leans down, tilting Hitoka’s head towards her. A fire sparks into existence between them, the frost melting away as if it had never existed to begin with, and Hitoka cannot help but kiss back as if her life depended on it. 

“Too many to count,” Hitoka says, not bothering to hide her smile when they part, “but you know I like hearing you ask.” 


End file.
